update on seminary

Today is a really high pain day (thanks fibromyalgia) and I have a migraine I’m having trouble kicking on top of it … so no Redeeming Love review today. I have a big week and I need to try to put myself back together a little bit. Instead I’d give you all a peek into what it’s like for me in seminary at the moment.

I’m taking two classes this semester– What is Religion and Social Analysis and Community Engagement. I’m excited about both so far, but it’s only a few weeks in so we’ll see if that feeling lasts beyond mid-terms.

For SACE, the big class project involves something called participatory action research— the description of it had so many buzz words I couldn’t help laughing because I had no idea what it really was. Then we read some work by Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, a latina theologian who is now one of my favorite people. I’m now in love with PAR, as it’s called, and I’ll be working with the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice for my project. Depending on what happens with that, I might ask you to be involved with my class project– wouldn’t that be exciting? We’ve also talked a lot about #BlackLivesMatter (!!) and we’re reading a book called Getting to Maybe: How the World is Changed— which is, so far, a truly enjoyable book to read as well as being inspiring.

What is Religion is one of the foundational seminary classes, and we got thrown into the deep end with Schubert Ogden’s “Theology and Religious Studies: Their Difference and the Difference It Makes.” That was … I think it was from that era in academia where if you didn’t obfuscate your writing you weren’t being scholarly enough or something. It was a little painful. But, after reading it three times I think the point he was making is an important one (theology isn’t just a massive case of special pleading, essentially).

We also turned in our first paper yesterday– a thesis proposal. It’s a little far out for me to be nailing down a thesis topic, but it’s going to be about something to do with Christian feminist ethics, so I went with it. We were required to put together a research bibliography, and I’m rather proud of it. I think it might also make an interesting reading list for anyone interested in Christian ethics, liberation theology ethics, sexual ethics, or feminist ethics. Since you’re here, reading my blog … chances are one of those is a topic of interest for you.

The bibliography is based on the paper’s requirement to demonstrate my awareness of and ability to interact with the “cultural and theological heritage” of my faith, so that’s why there’s Kant and Barth and Thomas Aquinas in there. It’s an attempt to incorporate the significant Christian ethicists in my tradition as well as pointing to all the significant and most relevant, formative texts in this particular sub-field. If anyone is noticing a huge gaping hole in this, feel free to point it out to me.

Bonus point for me: Embodiment was written by a professor at my seminary back in the day, and his work is one of the reasons why United is known for being one of the earliest LGBT-affirming seminaries in the country. United is also in the process of becoming a sanctuary school, and they released a statement opposing Trumperdink’s Muslim ban– just some of the many reasons why I’m happy I’m at this particular seminary right now.

I’m also taking on more work politically– I’m getting very involved with the local Democratic organization, as well as the organization that sprang out of Pantsuit Nation when the original founder decided to keep PN “story-based” (grr). It’s called Together We Will, now, and there’s local and state-level chapters of it, as well. It might be a group worth looking into if you want to be more active in your resistance to the regimeadministration.